Vorlesung Mittelalter: Byzantinische Heiligenviten vom 4. bis zum 11. Jh.: Literatur, Leben und Legende
Instructors: PD Dr. Thomas PratschShortname: VL Aufbaumodul
Course No.: 07.068.260b
Course Type: Vorlesung
Requirements / organisational issues
Commentary:The lecture gives an introduction into the Byzantine hagiographical literature which can be divided into various sub-genres: miracle collections, reports on translations of relics, commemorations in synaxaries and menologia as well as longer elaborated Saint's Lives (Vitae Sanctorum) which will be primarily in the focus of interest.
There are three main topics which will be extensively discussed:
1. On this literature in general: When and in which context was this literature produced? What are its prototypes and models? Which source texts possibly served as starting points for the elaboration of a comprehensive vita? How do we define (in Byzantium and in Christianity in general) the cult of saints? And which function did the vitae have within the cult of saints? What did the development of this literature look like up to the relative canonisation by Symeon Metaphrastes? Why and how did this canonisation come about? Did this canonisation actually mark an end point of the development of this literature? Where there any analogies or similarities in the development of Latin and Greek hagiographical literature in the first millennium AD?
2. On this literature in particular: How is this literature composed? What are the rhetorical rules and models applied by this literature? What are its literary elements or components? How can we assess its historicity? What is a literary topos? Which topoi are used by the authors of Byzantine hagiographical literature? What kind of source value do these texts have? How are anachronisms and mimesis used as literary stylistic devices in these texts? Are these texts historical sources or literary legends?
3. On the single texts: Is there something like a typology of Greek Saint's Lives? What about the scholarly subdivision in "monastic vitae" and "literary vitae" in traditional research? How can we form an opinion on the linguistic and stylistic differences between single vitae? How do they come about and do they justify the subdivision in different categories/types of vitae? Which range of form and content do the surviving vitae display? What do the very different lives tell us about the development of the cult of saints up to the end of the first millennium AD?
Additionally, we will talk about and consider also the latest handbooks/companions on Byzantine hagiography with their subordinate topics of "Periods and Places" as well as "Genres and Contexts" (see "Literatur" under "Material").
Dates
| Date (Day of the week) | Time | Location |
|---|---|---|
| 04/23/2025 (Wednesday) | 14:15 - 15:45 | 00 461 P11 1141 - Philosophisches Seminargebäude |
| 04/30/2025 (Wednesday) | 14:15 - 15:45 | 00 461 P11 1141 - Philosophisches Seminargebäude |
| 05/07/2025 (Wednesday) | 14:15 - 15:45 | 00 461 P11 1141 - Philosophisches Seminargebäude |
| 05/14/2025 (Wednesday) | 14:15 - 15:45 | 00 461 P11 1141 - Philosophisches Seminargebäude |
| 05/21/2025 (Wednesday) | 14:15 - 15:45 | 00 461 P11 1141 - Philosophisches Seminargebäude |
| 05/28/2025 (Wednesday) | 14:15 - 15:45 | 00 461 P11 1141 - Philosophisches Seminargebäude |
| 06/04/2025 (Wednesday) | 14:15 - 15:45 | 00 461 P11 1141 - Philosophisches Seminargebäude |
| 06/11/2025 (Wednesday) | 14:15 - 15:45 | 00 461 P11 1141 - Philosophisches Seminargebäude |
| 06/18/2025 (Wednesday) | 14:15 - 15:45 | 00 461 P11 1141 - Philosophisches Seminargebäude |
| 06/25/2025 (Wednesday) | 14:15 - 15:45 | 00 461 P11 1141 - Philosophisches Seminargebäude |
| 07/02/2025 (Wednesday) | 14:15 - 15:45 | 00 461 P11 1141 - Philosophisches Seminargebäude |
| 07/09/2025 (Wednesday) | 14:15 - 15:45 | 00 461 P11 1141 - Philosophisches Seminargebäude |
| 07/16/2025 (Wednesday) | 14:15 - 15:45 | 00 461 P11 1141 - Philosophisches Seminargebäude |